General Discussion

Found an excellent launcher called 8Start. It's very configurable, and supports categories, custom icons and wallpaper. It doesn't have a backup function like the portableapps launcher, but it can link to any file or folder, and uses either absolute or relative paths.
It takes a lot more configuring - you need to define at least one group and category, and the links have to be added one at a time, but they can be edited and moved around after they are created.
I've left my key apps in the PortableApps Launcher, and also a link to 8Start. I moved all the other apps into a separate folder, and linked them in 8Start.

I just downloaded the Portableapps tool a few days ago and I love it. It's a genius idea and easy to use. I even installed the Google tool bar into my portable Firefox without skipping a beat. It's a great app.

I have a question. Would it be possible to completely lock out the local OS, and force the system to only use the Portable apps? This would be great for security risk users and dangerously dumb users.
Just hand them a flash drive and no matter what computer they plug into they always access the same stuff and can't access anything else.

I'm sure you could do this by booting from the flash drive and using the MAC OS7 you have on the site, but that's a bit to technical and time consuming for the average dumb user.

Does anyone know how to create an ico file but with multiple size icons inside.

I noticed that portableapps comes wiht icons that contain about 5 different sizes in one single icon file.

Ideally instructions that mean i can use 32bit images with transparancy.

I just downloaded and installed Firefox 2.0.0.1 from Mozillas site on a Flash Drive with no problems whatsoever. Now it doesn't hang for long periods while loading like the PortableApps FF 2.0 does.

Under the Hardware Properties Policies of my USB drive should I:

Optimize USB for quick removal

OR

Optimize for performance?

Does it make a difference?

Is this for the device or the PC?

On many public computers and work computers, administrative rights are required to load applications. Portable Apps will not work on these PC's. Is there a way to overcome this? MOJOPac(PC in your pocket) has overcome this issue. Is there a way to use Portable Apps on these PC's?

I'm curious: Does the PortableApps installer do anything besides uncompress the data into a folder?

I needed to install the PortableApps suite onto a USB key that didn't quite have enough room on it, so I did this:

1) Install to a spare empty folder on hard disk

2) Delete unneeded apps from PortableApps in that folder

3) Copy the entire folder to the USB key

I'm assuming there would be no problems with doing this.

One of the nice things about portable applications is that their folders can be copied and moved around at will like this, and the application won't break, as everything is self-contained within the folder so nothing is left behind. Apps are well-behaved and politely stick to their own folders, and don't stomp on anything else, so there's never any "DLL hell" or registry bloat. Just like the good old days of DOS!

A while back I saw sites on eBay "selling" USB drives with your software pre-installed. In fact, I found your site because I plugged the words on those pages into Google and your pages came up near the top.

It has been a while since I had even looked on eBay for your products since I figure it was a waste of money and time after I found your site. However, it has been nagging me many months now regarding HOW those people could be selling those USB drives with your software on it. On their site I don't recall any links to Portableapps.com, that is why I used Google.

If I recall, they were selling the 512 Meg USB drives for something like $25 or $29.00. They DID say the software was included FREE, but after seeing 512 Meg drives at Tiger Direct for $10.00, it seems less free than FREE.

I'm working on a guide/FAQ for newbies. Hopefully that'll reduce the amount of questions we get.

A taste (may be revised later):
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I) Introduction/FAQ
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This guide is meant to answer many of the questions that often come from those
new to portable applications and external drives and reference for all who enjoy
using portable apps.

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* FAQ *
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Q. What does "portable" mean?

What does the launcher do and why do I want to launch the app from that instead of directly launching the program?